


A Troll in the Outer Yard

by Nadia_Hernandez



Category: Charmed (TV 2018)
Genre: Alternate Norse Religion & Lore, Angst, Comedy, Drama, F/M, Family Drama, Illusions, Jotunn | Frost Giant, Jötnar | Jotuns | Frost Giants (Norse Religion & Lore), Jötunheimr | Jotunheim, Magic, Magical Realism, Trolling, Trolls, Útgarðar | Utgard
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-01
Updated: 2020-05-18
Packaged: 2020-11-08 15:59:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,455
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20838191
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nadia_Hernandez/pseuds/Nadia_Hernandez
Summary: Maggie and the Hilltones worked hard on the summer project and have attracted a troll. Can Mel, Maggie and the power of sisterhood prevail against this strange new threat?





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This one was fun to write. And weird. I LOVE Norse myth. Also... only a few more days til the new season!!!

Margarita Emelia Vera awoke in a fantastic mood. She hadn’t experienced enough of those, of late, since Parker had gone off on his quest to find himself or… whatever. There had been teary-eyed nights spent with bad romantic comedies (and yeah, to be honest with herself and everyone else a gory zombie flick or two) on Netflix, lotsa chocolate chip everything and more than one visit to the porcelain confessional after too much red wine but… wasn’t that what being young, being in love and losing love was about? Joy and pleasure couldn’t exist without pain or at least that’s what she told her shower head. It had proven to be a surprisingly good confidant.

Lucy was another surprise. Although their relationship had been rocky for a while, considering the whole “I kissed your boyfriend” drama, followed up by the sturm and drang of “I got bewitched by a demon and totes tried to sell you and your sisters out to him, things had been awesome of late. Lucy was a better friend than Maggie remembered but maybe that was because she wasn’t trying to be so freaking ON all the time so she could get into Kappa and was just enjoying the other woman’s company.

Last night had been the culimation of their big, summer project--a musical, all female adaptation of Wrestlemania III starring Lucy as Shulk Hogan and Maggie as Andrea the Tiny Giant. Professor Miranda had greenlit what he referred to as their “magnum opus of madness” but let them take full responsibility for writing, staging and performing the whole thing. “It is not what I would have envisioned for a Hilltones summer musical,” he told Maggie late one night over an after rehearsal cup of strong, sweet Mexican hot chocolate, “but after my experience with the pan flute my mind has been a little more… open, shall we say, to different modalities of expression. Besides… GLOW is a popular show on Netflix, no? I say we ride the bandwagon.”

Maggie didn’t know much about that, preferring that which was offered for her viewing pleasure to be a little mushier in one way or another, but loved the heck out of him for acting as faculty advisor while they all crawled out on such a slender limb. She also loved Lucy for being her creative partner and absolute rock through all of this and just all the Hilltones for being the amazing women they were. Her sisters, too, had been supportive if skeptical. Even Harry, who had pronounced that he found the pleasure she and Melanie took in lucha libre to be a trifle barbaric, had offered her his gentle, crooked smile and said, “Whatever it takes to keep you off the streets and out of a gang of particularly well dressed young hoodlums, my dear.”

And so finally, finally, Minstrelmania III had opened to the an audience in rapture, thunderous applause and calls for an encore. In short? Mags was stoked. She could barely contain herself the next morning, felt like she was gonna really shake out of her skin, when she signed onto the Hilltonian blog to read her reviews.

The first ten were, as she had predicted ,glowing comments about her voice, their lyrics, Lucy’s dance and choreography skills, how Beth’s Rica Steamboat and Lauren’s Butch Girl Ronda Savage had blazed with chemistry on the stage. The eleventh was a tiny bit less pleasing.

show sucked. dumb idea, ugly as hell, stupid lyrics. andre the midget especially bad with her fat little legs and horseface hulkster. don’t try to play with the big boys little girls and don’t fuck up another classic.

Maggie felt her face grow hot and a cold ball grew in the pit of her stomach. Tears threatened but she was unsure if she was upset or if they were the tears of righteous, frigid rage. She wanted them to be the latter but… dammit she was pretty sure they weren’t.

She typed her reply with halting fingers:

Hey! Sorry that you didn’t like the show but there is no reason to be so rude about it! A lot of people worked very hard on it and even if it wasn’t your cup of tea you should respect that.

It took him only seconds to respond:

respec deez nutz bich

And only a few more to expand upon the sentiment by saying:

hoehs liek u r teh suc.

The exchanges went on for several days. The more Maggie tried to reason with him the crueler he became and, soon enough, others joined in the abuse. It felt like a swarm of ants stinging every inch of her skin. He (Maggie thought of the malignant commenter as “he” even though she didn’t really know… weren’t most trolls like this guys, anyway?) seemed to always know exactly how to find her soft places, where he could most cruelly dig in his talons. Beyond this he had knowledge of her life, her hopes and fears, which he should not have, which made her wonder if she was being stalked. When she asked the reply came:

y wud i stok an uggo? 2/10, wud not bang

He followed up seconds later with:

omfg jus fukkin kill yurslef already

These comments, stupid as they were (and Jesus Thor and Buddha were they stupid!) finally brought Maggie to actual weeping. Like, full on ugly crying. She hated it, hated herself for giving this creep what he probably wanted, but just couldn’t help it. She wondered if maybe he had a point. Why would he take the time out of his probably busy schedule to do this if he didn’t? She was ugly, the whole idea had been stupid… a razor blade and warm bath seemed like the right combination.

It was stupid, she knew it was stupid, and she couldn’t help herself. Nothing felt right, nothing could ever be right again. This creep would haunt her until she died, or maybe even afterwards. Finally broken, dangling at the end of her rope, Maggie collapsed to her desk in sobs. It was at just that moment that Melanie happened to have walked upstairs to head to bed and heard the commotion from her sister’s room.


	2. Chapter 2

Mel walked towards Maggie and laid a hand on her shoulder. “Hey, hey… what’s the matter, Puppy?” The nickname had come about when, after being told that she was about to get a baby sister, Melanie had informed Marisol that she would much rather have had a puppy instead. The elder Vera found it cute and let things slide in her usual, indulgent manner until Melanie had tried to teach Maggie to catch treats so that she could bring her to show and tell.

It ran through Maggie’s icy veins in the way only a sister’s kind words can. She shuddered away the chill she had felt earlier. Mel’s arms found their way around her shoulders, her chin came to rest on Maggie’s shoulder and she nuzzled her face against the younger woman’s. Her earlier vision, of a pale bloated corpse with wrists gashed down to the bone, seemed as ludicrous as it was grotesque.

She leaned into Melanie, her hero and big sister since she was born and forever, and told the whole tale. Mel, as was customary for her, did not accept the bad news with great grace. She stood, fists balled and eyes in angry slits. “So, we’re gonna go make this douchenozzle pay, right?”

Maggie shrugged. “What can we do? I don’t even know who he is. ‘Ankeknaten420’ isn’t exactly gonna pop on our searches for people in Hilltown, right?”

“You’re forgetting something important,” Mel said. “We’re witches, Mags. We don’t have to use Google, or even duck-duck-go. I’ve got a spell to run him down, and a couple more to make him super, super unhappy.”

It didn’t take long--less than thirty minutes, all told. They mixed in a bowl ground artemisia, nutmeg, mace and cayenne. The pugent smell of this last and the allspice they threw on after, while it simmered and sizzled in clove oil, made Maggie’s nose wrinkle up. Mel began to chant:

“We call to oracles across all time

And to witches of the Vaughn and Vera lines.”

Maggie sneezed, carefully away from them, so that she did not blow the flame from their black candles, and took up the spell:

“Marisol we call, and Melinda Warren,

Anicent mothers of our coven.”

Mel went on:

“And witches bound by love not blood,

Priyanka, she whose loss we wode.”

They finished together:

“Those women who have built our strength

Light now our path to shew us truth.”

The room shimmered and Maggie was certain she felt each of the women that they called on in it with her. She felt her mother’s arms on her shoulders, strong and sure, felt Elder Bari’s sharp, wise dark eyes and the ancient, towering presence of Melinda Warren. It made her skin crawl but, like, in a good way. It was hard to explain but maybe, given a million or so years, she could come close.It wasn’t going to happen today or tomorrow, though, because that’s not what today and tomorrow were about, after all.

Faces that she did not recognize swirled around her. Faces that were European, African and Native American. These were the women whose lives had built Maggie Vera, she knew, were where the soil where she had grown. The madness that had seized her earlier, had made her hate herself because of what some idiot on the internet typed from his cave, was laid bare for what it was: the nasty machinations of a troll, a small man who tore into the softest places of others and could only find happiness if he destroyed those who had no defense.

Finally, after a long dance of images that she would half remember in dreams for a long time, a name came to them. Jotnar Togarinn.

“Well,” Maggie said, “that was an awesome spell. Much more effective than googling it.”

Mel grinned. Sweat stood out on her forehead from the effort, from what this magic had cost her. She said, “I know, right? It’s even better than those script kids that I used to hang out with Hackorz 5 Sockal Just Us.”

“Totally.” Maggie frowned. “I’m not sure if they were trying to be edgy or if they were just, you know, illiterate.”

“Come on now, it wasn’t that bad. Tara was a cool chick. I liked her. She had a lot of great ideas.”

“You liked her cause she had big brown eyes, a haircut like the Tenth Doctor and the mask from the cover of Secret Samadhi tattooed between her shoulder blades.”

Mel held her hands up. “Okay, okay… you’ve been all… wounded, here, so I’m not gonna argue.”

Maggied hugged her tightly, impulsively. “Thank you… seriously. I… well, things had gotten weird in there before you walked past my room. The spell that Togarinn had on me. I might have done something sorta dumb if you hadn’t… you know.”

She hugged her back. It felt like the best, rightest thing in the world to Maggie. “Always, Puppy. So… now that we know who was fucking with you, what are we gonna do about it?”

“Er…” Maggie shrugged. “Sternly worded takedown on twitter? Apart from that I got nothing.”

“I think we need to pay the troll a visit and drag him out from under his bridge,” Mel said.

“That sounds like it could be emotionally satisfying but also a terrible idea,” Maggie said. “Violence isn’t the solution to every problem.”

“I didn’t suggest violence!” Mel said. 

“Your tone of voice totally suggested violence.”

“Well, he freaking cyber-magically metoo’d my baby sister,” Mel said. “Forgive me if I kinda want to use a litle magic of my own to make this dweeb ravage his own testicles like a chimp attacking a rhesus monkey.”

Maggie giggled. “That was graphic.”

“Besides,” Mel said, “you know you’re not the only person he’s done this to, or is doing this to, or is gonna do it to, but you might be the only one who is in a position to recognize what is going on and actually do something about it. You owe it to the next person he fucks with like this.”

“I guess you’re right,” Maggie said. “So, uh… do we wanna bring Harry and Macy in on this?”

“Definitely not Harry--no reason to upset him for no reason--and besides, he and Macy are off on on of their super long walks at the Botanical Gardens.”

“You know I told her that they would get more privacy if they just rented a room,” Maggie said.

“And how did she respond?”

“About like you imagine she would. I mean, Harry’s like a hundred years old and yet somehow Macy is still more old-fashioned than he is. It’s kinda cute, actually.” She drew a deep breath, steeled herself. “So… it’s the power of two this time, I guess.”

“Yeah, but it’s the power of two totally badass sisters so you know it’s gonna be enough.”

“Hells yeah,” she said. “Let’s do this thing.”


	3. Chapter 3

It didn’t take long to find Jotnar Togarinn’s dingy little off-campus apartment. Well, “lair” might have been a better term, actually, Maggie reflected. The people all seemed sallow and grimy, like they should have been in that old, stupid SNL sketch about an Appalachian emergency room and the place hadn’t been papered or painted in, well… ever, probably.  
They found a splintery, dusty door with J. Togarinn scrawled on it in black magic marker. Cobwebs gathered at the corners, above the frame, and a lazy collection of harvestmen and ogres dandled in them. Maggie rapped at the door with her knuckles. “Hello… Mr. Togarinn? Are you in?”

A strangled voice squealed from beyond the door. “GTFO, we’re rapin faces back here.”

Mel glowered at the door. “That sounds like exigent circumstances to me.”

“Yeah, but we’re totally not cops,” Maggie said. “We don’t have exigent circumstances!”

“Charmed Ones are like cops but less racist,” Mel explained. “We totally have exigent circumstances. Besides… after that, I’m gonna give this guy a piece of my mind one way or another. 

A quick spell gained them entry--and thank all the gods and goddesses that were or might have been, Maggie thought, because Mel’s next step would have been kicking down the door. It was its own sort of magic, in a way, but seemed like a little bit of a noisy option for the middle of an apartment building’s hallway, even one as skeevy as this.

They stepped across the threshold and each was fiilled with immediate regret for at least one decision she had made. Maggie grimaced. “Oh my god… oh god. It smells like, I don’t know… it smells like…”

Mel gagged. “It smells like ass, piss sitting in bottles and Mountain Dew that’s been poured over ass.”

“Graphic,” Maggie said, “it certainly paints a picture. But I can’t say it’s wrong or anything.”

“You forgot one thing.” It was a new voice, from a far room, and its owner stepped out of the shadows. “My beloved Fluttershy in her jar of my… essense.” He giggled and held up a simple glass mason jar. It was crusty and filled with layers of semen that had long since decomposed into a solid, brown mass. The pony figurine, against all odds and contrary to sanity, seemed to be alive and was frolicking in the top layer.

Mel blinked. “Well, if I wasn’t gay before…” She shook her head. “Okay, what the fuck dude? What is going on, here?”

It was obvious from Togarinn’s appearance that he was no ordinary internet troll and that this was no normal neckbeard’s nest. He was short and fat, so nothing unsual so far, but the thickly furred, warty skin was bluish in color. Short tusks protruded from his lower lip and he wore--what else--an ahegao t-shirt featuring lolicon characters, cargo shorts, flip-flops and a fedora. “Welcome to my sanctuary,” he said. The voice vascilated between a grunt and a squeal.

“Hi,” Maggie said. “Hi. So, um… I’m the girl that you told to go kill herself, among other things, and I’m pretty sure that you hexed me so well that I almost did it, so… I’m just gonna ask you nicely to NOT do that in the future and hopefully you’ll do that and my sister and I can just get the heck out of here before our nostrils are seared permanently shut?”

Togarinn glowered for a moment and then burst into ugly, stony laughter. He said to Mel, “She must be a total noob at, like, life, huh? Jeez…” He peered closely at Maggie. “Which girl are you that I told to kill herself? There must be at least a dozen this week… hmm…”

He stepped closer and then snapped his short, grimy fingers. “Aha! You’re Maggie Vera from the Wrestlemania musical--Andre the Giant!” He nodded approvingly. “It wasn’t a bad show, really. You did a decent job, and the Steamboat and Savage number as actually good.” He nodded.

“Okay I’m confused,” Maggie said. “If you liked it then why did you post all those mean comments?”

“I’m a troll,” he said. “An actual honest to Jotunheim troll. My people sow misery and mischief wherever we can, and have on Migard ever since your world was a twinkle on the underside of Ymir’s skull. If not for us there would be no balance in the world. Just as heroes must have dragons to slay an artist must have a troll to spur her on to greater heights.” He inclined his head towards Mel. “This one gets it. I can tell.”

She narrowed her eyes at him. “I have no idea what you mean.”

“You grew up on Net 2.0, sugar tits, and posted some pretty shitty things about all kinds of people. You were my sister as much as hers when you were doing that and you did a good job.” He chuckled. It was not a pleasant sound. “Some of those bands you racked so bad on myspace got hella good. Some didn’t and they went away but… isn’t that the point?”

“I’m nothing like you,” Mel hissed. “I never told anybody to kill themselves, for one thing, and I damn sure never used a hex to try to make it happen! And you’re not going to again.”

“That’s where you’re wrong,” he said. “I will do what I have done for ages and in the way I’ve done it. As for the hexing? It’s my nature… I feed on the misery of the artist, and if a lesser soul dies because I’ve done my duty then that is one less clump of shit clinging to the diamonds. I torture all so that the unworthy are destroyed and I’m gonna keep on doing it. So GTFO, little girls.”

“You’re a troll,” Maggie said. “Well, that’s cool. That’s what you are. We’re Charmed Ones and we’re gonna kick your ass.”

“I’d like to see you try,” Togarinn said. “Trolls take some killing.” He dropped into a fighting stance and the pudgy, off-balance little man became the famous feral beast of legend. “A threesome with hot sisters… how did a simple troll ever get so lucky?”  
Mel and Maggie prepared their spells and knew that this was going to be a rough fight. Winnable, sure, but definitely the kind of thing that having their sister and Whitelighter along for would have been nice. It was gonna get messy--for one thing Maggie was almost certain that they’d knock at least one of his piss jugs over before all was said and done--and she knew on a level deeper than knowing that the smell of this place was never gonna come out of her lemon blazer.

Suddenly, before the battle could be joined, a sudden, rushing heat filled the room and a ringing soprano called out, “Stop this foolishness at once!”

And that’s when things got weird.


	4. Chapter 4

The newcomer was tall, at least a head taller than Maggie, and definitely possessed feminine characteristics. That was about all they could tell about her, though, because she also appeared to be burning. It was a weird reflection of her time as a Charmed One, Maggie thought, that she could tell that this lady was on fire but not, like, in a bad way, not like someone or more likely thing that had just popped out of Tartarus to make their lives a little harder. The fire produced no smoke, for one thing, and didn’t reek of sulfur like her time in that deep pit had which, well… she couldn’t decide if the whole brimstone smell would have made Togarinn’s apartment worse or just gone unnoticed in the melange of things making a general assault on her nose.

The troll stamped his wide, flat feet. “It’s not fair, Hugi. These witches are mine! I caught the little one and they came to me fair and square. I get to eat em!”

“No,” she said. “Thou stepped beyond the bounds set for thee, troll. It was in thy purview to torment artists so that they might reach for the stars, not to bewitch them into destruction for the sake of filling thy own fat gullet.”

“How else am I to eat?” he asked. “It’s not like this job pays--even minimum wage--and even if it did it’s not like I can go to the goddamn Popeyes and order up the blood of a Christian. Do you know how weird they’d look at me?”

“No moreso than I do upon the spells thou hast wrought.” She grimaced. “A pony dancing in thy rotten seed… really, troll, is this the best that thou canst do? Thou art a child of Jotunheim the same as me, pain me though it does to admit this.”

“I’m not really so bad, Hugi,” he said. He offered her a nasty, leering grin that was all broken teeth and the stench of rotten meat. “You even thought I was kinda cute, once upon a time.”

“Perhaps, but no more,” she said. “Return thee to the Outer Yards, troll. Begone from this leaf of the tree and trouble those of Midgard no more. Thy king would have words with thee.” 

He started to say something but before he could get out the first word she snapped her fingers and in a puff of smoke and fire he disappeared. The filthy room swirled and, in seconds, was just a bare, shabby room in off-campus housing once more. Maggie ran a hand through her hair. “Um… thanks,” she said. It sounded kind a lame but, well, whatever. “Thanks. I’m Maggie, by the way, and this is my sister, Mel.”

The flaming woman, Hugi, turned the glowing coals that were her eyes upon the sisters. “I know thee well, Charmed Ones, as I know the other branches that have sprung from Melinda Warren’s tree. It is a honor to meet you and to bring you the greetings of my queen.” She snorted. “She offers her blessing and notes that you would be great opponents, should your paths happen to cross hers.”

“Your queen?” Mel said. “Who is that? Who are you?”

“My queen is Loki of the Outer Yards, just as he is the king of that and all the other trolls. She sits upon his cold throne in a palace made of ice and watches all you bugs scurry along the bark of Yggdrasil.” She reached out to gently stroke Maggie’s hair. Her fingers were hot, duh, but to Maggie’s surprise did not hurt or, you know, make the product in her hair start to smoke. “Some of thee happen to have bright colors, though, and it amuses her to watch thee struggle and succeed. He does not like it when his creatures take undo advantage of thee.”

Mel rubbed her head. “Okay, you have a king and a queen but… you’re talking about them like they’re the same person?”

“Loki of the Outer Yards encompasses more than thou canst imagine, little witch, though thou art wise beyond thy years. He is my queen, and she is also my king. When thou lookest up to the stars at night, thou sees the twinkling of her eyes… but thou knowest well indeed that those are but balls of burning gas seen at a great distance.” She winked. “What is myth but truth told slant indeed?”

“That’s clear as mud,” Mel said. “Why do you magical creatures always have to talk in riddles?”

She shrugged. “Magic poses the question that science must strive to answer, and then when that answer is given must be posed again.”

Mel sighed. “Clear. As. Mud.”

“I must be gone from you,” she said. “It was good to meet you, Charmed Ones, and to aid you against a creature such as my foolish brother.” She sighed. “He is not evil, I hope you understand. Corrupt, venal and greedy for a certainty but not truly evil. He is too stupid to be evil.” With that, and a crackling rush of flame, she was gone.

“You know, we have had one weird ass day,” Maggie said.

“I can’t disagree,” Mel said. “Can’t wait to tell Harry and Macy about this. Can you imagine the looks on their faces?”

“It’s gonna be kinda epic,” Maggie agreed. “He’ll do that thing where his eyes sorta bug out of his head and she’ll do the little head tilt. You know the one.”

“Totally, totally.” Mel laid an arm across her sister’s shoulders. “You feeling better now, Puppy?”

Maggie rested her head on Mel’s collarbone. “Yeah. It was so weird… I knew all those bad feelings were coming from outside of me but I couldn’t push em away. It was driving me crazy.”

“I think that was kinda the point. And don’t feel too bad. If I’m remembering my mythology right even Thor got twisted around by shit from Utgard-Loki’s court.”

“Jeez,” Maggie said. “I guess if Chris Hemsworth couldn’t handle it we’re all screwed, huh?”

Mel chuckled. “I guess. I’m glad we got it straightened out, though. You’re a pretty good sister, even if I never could teach you how to fetch.” She kissed her on the head. “Let’s go home. I think a day like this calls for rellenos de papa and maduros.”

It sounded like a great plan to Maggie, and she said as much. They left the apartment never to return, and tried not to think about it too much when the building faded behind them and from their memories.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The end of my weird little passion project! Finally :D


End file.
